The Fathers Special Interest Group advocates for the inclusion of fathers when studying and treating perinatal mental illness.

Our mission is to provide education, resources, and updates on the cutting-edge research and clinical practices on father mental health and father involvement in the family during the perinatal period.

Our vision is for clinicians and researchers to be informed about the importance of fathers’ perinatal mental health and contribution to the family to support the ultimate goal of improving family health outcomes. Currently, we have almost 150 members worldwide and growing. We have created a member-only listserv to distribute information and create dialogue amongst the Fathers SIG. We want to create an international community and a dialogue father mental health globally.

More About Us

The Fathers SIG hosted a roundtable at the International Marcé Society Biennial Scientific Meeting 2020 to provide education about research, clinical practice, and policies on fathers during the perinatal period. During the roundtable, we opened membership to all Marcé members who were interested in or currently incorporating fathers into their work.

The Fathers SIG’s paper Expanding the international conversation with fathers’ mental health: toward an era of inclusion in perinatal research and practice (2021) was published by the Archives of Women’s Mental Health in the 40th anniversary special issue. We developed this paper to provide an overview of paternal perinatal mental health, assessment of paternal depression/anxiety, the impact on the family, and offer future directions for the field of paternal perinatal mental health.

In June 2022, we hosted a webinar on Engaging Fathers in Clinical Practice to discuss best practices of working with fathers, with a focus on father mental health and how fathers can be utilized to support family health across the fields of psychology, psychiatry, Ob/Gyn, pediatrics, and perinatal sexual/gender minority health.

We are encouraging any International Marcé members who are clinicians or researchers and interested in understanding the importance of fathers in their work to join our SIG by contacting the Fathers SIG chair.

To join, contact sheehan.fisher@northwestern.edu

STEERING COMMITTEE